Run to the Ground
by CoffeeOwl
Summary: "What's bothering you? You know, aside from crazy vampire-obsessed-moonlight-collecting psychopaths?" Reid's pensive stare zeroed in on Morgan's face. He whispered: "This plane's going the wrong way." The team find themselves at the mercy of men who aren't just hijackers. They're hunters. Latest chapter features much Reid whump. Enjoy.
1. The Scenic Route

"We should have taken off by now."

"They said we'd set off in ten minutes."

"That was twenty minutes ago, JJ."

"Morgan, sit down. We'll take off when we take off."

"You say that as if we have all the time in the world."

"He has a point, if Reid's right about the lunar phase – ritualistic aspect of the killings; we only have two nights to crack this."

"Yes, Hotch, I know," JJ sighed, rubbing her brow with the palm of her hand in exhausted frustration. It was way too early in the morning for this. "I'll go talk to the pilots again, see what's taking so long."

Just as she said those words, the plane began to shift along the runway. "Huh, problem solved."

"There's nothing I love more than flying," Rossi murmured.

* * *

They had spent a solid couple of hours dissecting down the victimology and methodology of the newest murderer and had now fallen into an impatient silence. Suddenly, a confused expression appeared on Reid's face which Morgan – who was sitting just opposite, listening to his music – couldn't help but notice. He watched as Reid looked all around the cabin, his eyes darting back and forth, up and down, out the window… All the while, his mouth was clearly working over calculations, mouthing numbers and words quietly to himself. When the look of confusion solidified into something more worried, Morgan took off his headphones and leaned forward.

"What's bothering you? You know, aside from crazy vampire-obsessed-moonlight-collecting-unicorn hunter psychopaths?"

Reid's pensive stare zeroed in on Morgan's face.

He leaned forward so their faces were barely a hands breadth away from each other, and then whispered: "This plane's going the wrong way."

"What?" he laughed; laughed more out of surprise than amusement. Though there was a little amusement given the comically frightened look on Reid's face.

"We flew too far north earlier, and I thought it was just a diversion or something – I hadn't even really noticed it when it happened – but we didn't turn back southwards to correct it. Travelling at this speed for the last hour and a half, in this direction, given the weather conditions (provided they were correctly predicted), hmm…" he trailed off, looking thoughtfully down.

"So? Where are we headed?" Morgan enquired in a neutral voice that was a compromise between concerned and entertained.

A short calculation later, Reid looked up at Morgan blankly and replied, "I don't know."

"Think we should tell the others?"

"It could be nothing. I could have imagined it?"

"Or it could be heavy traffic on the motorways of the skies and they're just taking the scenic route."

Reid nodded slowly, uncertainly. "Or it could be a hijacking."

"I suppose it could."

"Mhhmm."

"_Hotch?_"

* * *

Just as they began to discuss what could be done to investigate the situation, the overhead speakers crackled into life.

"We'll be landing in round about ten minutes," murmured a monotonous, unfamiliar voice.

"At which point, we ask that you all exit calmly at the rear of the plane and evacuate via the emergency exit." Another chillingly unfamiliar voice: this one barely containing its excitement beneath its officious wording.

Then that first voice again, "We'll give you, say, half an hour. A head start."

Then the little crackles again. Then silence.


	2. A Head Start

Precisely ten minutes had passed before the jolt of wheels against rough ground was felt. The jolt passed through each spine and jangled everyone's already shaken nerves. Everyone unfastened their seatbelts and sat up on edge. Morgan stood up and tensed his muscles in such a way as to suggest he was on the verge of attacking someone, but with no visible target, he just looked comically alarmed and aimless.

Hotch stood to join him and took on the responsibility of command. "I think we can safely assume they are armed if they've managed to hijack the jet. There's no chance any of you have your handguns with you?"

"Hotch, they're stored in the safety hold," JJ replied, "as per usual. They'll be locked away. I'm not even sure I know where they stash them while we're in flight. 9/11, you know? Security's taken a lot more-"

"We should get out of here," Garcia exclaimed stiffly. She stood up and was now pacing in tiny circles, her eyes wide and magnified behind her rosy-coloured glasses. "We should get out of here _now_."

"They're armed; there are at least two of them. We need whatever weapons, whatever tools we can find," Blake explained calmly.

"What we need to do is get out of here before they get impatient." Rossi started rummaging through closets and cupboards, looking for anything that could be of help. "Where's the damn first-aim box?"

Reid stood and made a bee-line path to the front of the cabin, to the little cupboard built into the jet. It was locked but the small metal key was sticking out of the door, which opened easily enough. "It's not here. But it's _always_ here."

"First-aid box? Why do we need a first-aid box? We need to get out of here!" Garcia exclaimed.

"Why isn't the first-aid box there?"

"That first voice we heard, the low, mono-syllabic, bored-sounding voice. I think he might be the dominant partner," Blake explained. "He was the first to speak, he sounded more in control and authoritative."

"Whereas the other voice was excessively excited. He can't wait to get this – whatever _this_ is – started," Rossi mused.

"We really don't have enough to go on here. Nothing we've heard so far give any indication of how many are in on this, what they're aims are… we don't even know which partner is the more dangerous one."

"What we do know is we have to get away from them."

"Baby doll, take a deep breath. Take your laptop with you, and anything else that could be useful. Damn – there's no phone signal. Where the hell are we?"

"Derek, there are crazy people on the jet, we're in the middle of nowhere, they have _guns_, we don't even have _phones_. _We need to get out of here. Now._" She was whispering in a frantic tone of voice through an expression of shear panic.

"Maybe we can ambush them. What do you think? They won't expect it. If we can just jump them the moment they open the door to leave the jet, they won't know what hit them. It's seven of us against, what? Two? Three-?"

"_Damn it, Morgan. You have never been SHOT. You don't know what it feels like to have a bullet tear through your flesh and rattle around inside of you." _Garcia had interrupted him to stand an inch in front and stare him down as if she was the taller of the stopped dead in his tracks, his violent glare instantly disarmed by her own likewise vicious look. Her glossy lips tightened and she thrust forward an accusatory finger at his chest. "You don't _know_." Her own expression became sombre just as quickly. "But you've seen your friends shot. And I know you don't want to see that again." Her finger crumpled into her fist which fell to rest against his chest, just over his heart. "I don't want to see you get shot," she whispered. Their worried glances met and they found themselves sharing an unexpectedly tender moment in the middle of the panic and uncertainty. Garcia visibly shook herself out of the trance and again began to spout panic. "So we should really get out of here before these hijackers – whoever they are – decide to come out and introduce themselves. And their guns. And their motives. Whatever they are…"

"I'm with her on this; we can't stick around here and wait for an explanation." Hotch, collected as always, was grabbing hold of his bag and moving towards the door. Everyone had looked away, occupied themselves with their own business to give the two most emotionally off-balanced members a moment to calm themselves and extinguish their heated thoughts against one another's. They were about ready to leave, bags hoisted over shoulders and senses weary of the slightest change.

"Well, there's nothing in the jet but coffee grounds and biscuits. Who stocks these damn things? Not a round of ammo in sight."

"This isn't a game, Rossi."

"It is a game. '_We'll give you, say, half an hour. A head start.'_"

"Reid?"

"'A head start', as if it's a race. A game. It's a skewed, arbitrary advantage given to the weaker party."

"We're being toyed with."

"So what, they open the doors, we run out and they use us as target practice? Is that what we're theorising?"

"What else? They've hijacked the plane and rerouted us just to show us these magnificent pine trees? Give us a head start bird watching?" Rossi was still rummaging around in the cupboards, picking out this and that and then throwing it back. "There's nothing here. We should go."

"I think I should stay."

Everyone stopped they're frantic searching and collecting to look at her.

"Blake?"

"I think I should stay, hide somewhere, wait until they leave to do whatever it is they're planning, then make a break for the control room, send a message out. If that doesn't work, I'll try to find the guns." She stood there with her bag thrown over her shoulder and the fiercest determination written across her face. There was an air of intimidation about her that startled her colleagues into silence for a moment.

"No."

"Garcia, look. We need to keep our options open here. Anything that could give us the slightest advantage-"

"No. Blake, you should get out of here. They need you, to… analyse speech, language, syntax… you need to build a profile. It's our best weapon right now. Even when we have guns, it's still the deadliest thing we have."

"If I can get to the controls, just send out a message…"

"I'll do it. I'll stay."

"Babydoll?"

"That's my special skill. It's what I always do, my doves: hide away in some secret place only to appear, wave my technomagical wand and save the day at the perfect moment. I can do it. I can." Everyone stood frozen, their expressions frosted over with varying levels of indecision and fear.

Reid glanced at his watch. "Twelve minutes, forty-eight seconds. We have just over seventeen minutes left of our… head start." The tableau melted back into life, into action.

* * *

Rossi slammed open a bottom cupboard he was standing beside and dragged out a pile of tins and supplies. "If we're going to do this, we'll have to do it quick. Here." He directed Garcia into the dark empty crawlspace, and when she had tucked herself away as best as she could, he covered her over with food goods and boxes until they deemed it passably convincible.

"Twelve minutes, seven seconds."

"Let's get out of here."

"Can you hear me?"

"My lord?"

"Princess, good luck. Be careful."

The pile of biscuits shifted slightly and whispered, "You too."


	3. Quiet…

Verb confusion edited. Thank you, marcallie, much appreciated. Please review, friends. Whether it's kudos, hate mail, or grammatical corrections, I love hearing from you.

* * *

Once past the emergency door and out in the craggy woodland, the team broke into a violent run to get as far as possible from the plane as they could. They tore down hills and furrows, over rocks, past trees and under low-hanging branches.

"Anyone see any buildings in the distance?"

"I see thorns. Weeds. Bugs."

"I can barely see sunlight through all these trees."

"Poison ivy. Crows. Mosquitos."

"Rossi, I think we should move more quietly."

"However quietly we move, the birds we meet on the way will fly up; like black traitorous flares. Main thing is to keep running, hard and fast."

Suddenly, a sound broke forth, like a mechanical moaning of a microphone. A flurry of birds startled and filled the skies all around the forest. A few crackles followed before a booming, mighty voice spoke out.

"Run. Fight. Hide… There are no rules…" _crackle… crackle…_ "Losing conditions: you die. Mauled by mountain lions, poisoned by snakes, it doesn't matter how. You die, you lose." _Crackle… crack… _"Our winning conditions: we're the ones that make you lose. Set a trap. Fire a gun. It doesn't matter. You die, we win."

A calm, distressingly steady voice slowly explained this all via whatever overhead sound system they had rigged up. The team carried on moving, silently, tensely.

Another voice broke out and sent another calamitous wave of birds into the air. "This'll be the greatest challenge _yet!_ FBI agents. _FB-bloody-I agents. _We've worked our way up, you can be damn sure. All the way up, round after round of battles… of bullets. This'll be the most exciting tournament of wits yet. The crowning pinnacle of glory…" _crackle… cackle, cackle… _more laughter, chillingly sinister in its high, electrically-distorted way, before again the voice, "We shall mount your heads over our fireplace before the day is out. You can be sure of it. And there's nothing you can do about it, FBI. Not without your precious guns." _Cackle… cackle._

The crackling of movement, the handing over of the microphone. "Your head start is up. Let the game begin."

_Crackle… screech… _

Silence.

* * *

The team continued moving further into the forest, as quickly as they could.

"Say that last part of Unsub One's speech again."

"'_Our winning conditions we're the ones that make you lose Set a trap Fire a gun It doesn't matter -_'" Reid reeled off fluently.

"Enough, already. Is reciting it again and again really helping anything?"

"Shhh… quiet…"

Quiet.

"Rossi, I don't hear anything."

"They can't possibly have caught up with us yet."

"I thought I heard a shout."

"A shout? What kind of shout?"

"I don't know, I-"

"Was it far away? Back at the jet? Rossi, was it a man or a woman?"

"It sounded closer, but I couldn't really tell… just... be quiet for a minute."

The group slowed down a fraction, more out of weary paranoia than exhaustion, though their frantic escape was cause enough for either. It wasn't long before they came upon a narrow-sided ravine, dry of whatever water had flown there in the past and instead flourishing with thick, colourful foliage. Their hands were forced, they had no alternative but to change direction and bend their course to accommodate for the steep, rocky gorge. It would take longer to get further from the plane, and it would be more difficult to track the location back later, but there was nothing else that could be done save breaking necks in attempt to surmount the dangerous obstacle. They made silent progress, no more than the snaps of broken branches and crushed undergrowth to announce their movements. Their backs were stiff with tension, their ears pricked up with paranoia.

"Well, I don't hear any-"

_Bang. Bang-bang._

He didn't even have time to shout before he tumbled down the steep ravine.

The screaming would come later.


	4. Footsteps

My exams are finally over, so I thought I'd update with my longest chapter yet. Enjoy, and please review. I like to know what you all think of this late-night brain child of mine.

* * *

However slowly and shallowly she tried to breathe, it still sounded worryingly loud. She was convinced they'd hear her. Her only chance at this rate was if they gave the cabin only the most perfunctory glance before they dismounted the jet. _Come on… get out of here already. I'm gonna suffocate in here._

Garcia's cheeks flushed with adrenaline and heat. The tiny space into which she had been crammed was feeling smaller and smaller as time went by, the air more and more stifling.

A door set off a clunk sound that echoed about the cabin. She held her breath. _Go away. Go away. Just keep moving._

Clunk. _Slam…_

Footstep. Footstep. The swishing sound of rough fabric brushing against itself with each and every footstep. Footstep…

There was the distinctive sound of a gun cocking. The footsteps stopped.

_Oh please, oh please. If I ever said I could die happy if only I was drowning in a pile of sugary snacks, this was not how I pictured it. Keep moving, please, just keep walking._

The next footstep was placed just outside the cupboard. She could picture it. If the door swung open, it would be just there.

Another footstep. More swish of fabric. Whoever it was just in front of her had just bent down.

_Oh no. Oh no, oh no, oh no._

Then more rough-sounding movements.

_Please, Buddah, Jesus, Santa – if any of you are watching my back right now, please…_

Then the unmistakeable sounds of… shoelaces being tied.

Garcia's sigh of relief was caught just short of being heard.

Someone stood up, wiped their face, made a little grunting sound to clear their throat, shifted their gun where it rested on a strap over their shoulder, and turned around. Walked back to the cockpit. Footstep. Footstep.

Garcia almost fainted.

* * *

"All clear," she heard someone say. "Let's get this party started!"

"Just got the sound system rigged up. We'll give them the full head start. Might as well make this a challenge."

"C'mon. I'm ready. Let's do it!"

"Settle down, you. We'll give them the full time. It'd be too easy otherwise; they've practically laid down a red carpet with all the tracks and noise they're making. You said FBI would be any good at this? Idiot."

"They're _FBI_. Could you think of anyone better?"

"_Boy scouts _would be fucking better."

"_Fucking _boy scouts would be better," he murmured.

"You're sick. Get out of here. I'll make the announcement."

"You always do. Pass the mike."

"I'll make the announcement. Say a word and I'll shoot you too. It's all shooting fish in a barrel anyway."

"You always make the announcement."

"And why do you think that is? Who do you think this is all for?"

"…"

"Why are we doing all this?"

"For you."

"That's goddamn right, for me. Now you don't say a single word."

"Fine."

"Good."

* * *

Garcia held her breath. Someone walked by her again. They were looking for something. Thankfully the thing they were looking for wasn't her, and wasn't in the cupboard. They kept walking. A moment later, they walked back. Swish, swish. Step step. Garcia let out a breath.

* * *

"The guns'll be locked away somewhere."

"I couldn't find them."

"That's because they'll be locked away somewhere. Check the luggage."

"Did you find the code to the lock there?"

"Hang on."

Rustling papers. A compartment opening and closing, then another one. More rustling papers. Rustling fabric.

"Ah. The pilot had it written in his goddamn wallet, the fool. Got it?"

"Got it. But why bother getting their guns? We've got enough."

"Just get them, yeah?"

"Fine."

* * *

_So the older voice, the authoritarian one: a father? An uncle? A teacher? A hunting instructor?_ _I should be taking notes. The others are so much better at this than me. Computers are really all I'm good for. And I'd be back in Quantico now, surrounded by them, if I hadn't opened my big mouth and volunteered my encyclopaedic knowledge of unicorns and vampires for that other case…_

A door opened. Footsteps. A compartment was opened up. Someone began putting in a code, _beep… beep_… when they were interrupted by the screech of a microphone.

"Damn it," the man in the cabin whispered. "Started without me."

Footsteps. He left without the guns he came for.

* * *

There were a few electric crackles, and then a booming voice that shook the jet.

"Run. Fight. Hide… There are no rules…" _crackle… crackle…_ "Losing conditions: you die. Mauled by mountain lions, poisoned by snakes, it doesn't matter how. You die, you lose." _Crackle… crack… _"Our winning conditions: we're the ones that make you lose. Set a trap. Fire a gun. It doesn't matter. You die, we win."

A calm, distressingly steady voice slowly explained this all via an overhead sound system. A microphone was torn from one set of hands and clenched by another.

The young man's voice broke out, barely keeping the gleeful malice contained. "This'll be the greatest challenge _yet!_ FBI agents. _FB-bloody-I agents. _We've worked our way up, you can be damn sure. All the way up, round after round of battles… of bullets. This'll be the most exciting tournament of wits yet. The crowning pinnacle of glory…" _crackle… cackle, cackle… _more laughter, chillingly sinister in its high, electrically-distorted way, before again the voice, "We shall mount your heads over our fireplace before the day is out. You can be sure of it. And there's nothing you can do about it, FBI. Not without your precious guns." _Cackle… cackle._

* * *

"Idiot. You never do what I say, do you? You never learn? I told you I'd be making the announcement, didn't I?"

"Uh. I mess up _one time!"_

"You never stop messing up. It's because you don't listen. Just get out there, already. Take the lead, for all I care. You're only doing this for yourself; don't think I don't know it."

"It's for you. You know it is. I caught them for you, father."

"Just get that ugly mug out of my face, you cretin. Why couldn't you be more like your brother?"

"Stop comparing me to him. I'm not like him."

"Just get out."

"I'm going. Jeez. Fine."

_Father… it's a father-son dynamic. Makes sense: authoritarian father, disobedient son, amateur Bambi-mother slaughters. Grew up hunting. Needed bigger prey. Why all the bickering, though? Maybe this could be used to our advantage, somehow?_

Just at that moment, she heard footsteps. Someone descended from the plane. A short while later, and at a much slower pace, another set of footsteps. They were both out of the plane.

Garcia waited a while longer before slowly and carefully making her way out of the cupboard.

_The pilots. I have to go check on them. And they have the code to the gun safe with them. But I should make sure they're okay first. Priorities. Or should the guns take priority? It's not like an ambulance will come before the guns come in handy. _

Slowly the cupboard door swung open and a packet of biscuits tumbled out. She froze, but nothing happened and a minute later she continued to slowly disentangle herself from her hiding place. Once out, she crept carefully towards the cockpit. The door was ajar. When she pulled it open, she had to bite on her lip to keep from screaming.

The pilots' safety instantly went down to the bottom of her list of priorities. One lay on top of the other at the side of the small room, each with his throat gaping open like a second mouth. A twisted, red, toothless mouth, grinning sardonically at her. Taking a moment to regain herself, she opened her eyes and crawled closer. Holding her breath and using only the tips of her fingers, she opened the pilot's jacket and checked for a wallet. It wasn't there. She was about to begin the unsavoury job of moving the top body to check the pockets of the other, when she noticed the wallet lying in front of a cupboard built into the side of the cock pit. Snatching it up with a tiny, triumphant outbreath, she flipped it open and found the code, written very conspicuously on a piece of card. _Ah ha. Got it. Now, where's that safe?_ _Or should I see about sending out a message first?_ She glanced up at the mess of machinery before her and felt her heart drop. _Okay. Easy tasks first: get a gun so I can protect myself, then find out exactly how much of my computer prowess is transferable to jet piloting…_

By then, enough time had passed that she felt she could move around with relative safety. Still, she moved down the jet bent double in case she could be seen through the windows. In truth, she didn't feel she really needed a gun at that moment, but it would be a good comfort blanket and it wouldn't take long to get. The safe was easy to find, the compartment door was open still.

She put in the code and the little light turned green and offered up three happy beeps. _Guns. Thank God. They're all here_.

Suddenly, a sound caught her attention. A tiny crackle of plastic. Someone had just stepped on the corner of a packet of biscuits. She spun around fast enough to make her head spin, at the same time as flinging her arms towards the weapons at her side.

A man dressed completely in camouflage gear was barely ten feet from her, staring right at her, his gun in hand. She fumbled with her own at the same time as he raised his. She threw herself across to the other side of the walkway as she aimed, but there was hardly any time to get out of his crosshairs before he fired.

She shot back twice.


	5. Straight into a ravine

"Well, I don't hear any-"

_Bang. Bang-bang._

He didn't even have time to shout before he tumbled down the steep ravine.

The screaming would come later.

* * *

"Reid! _Reid!_"

"Morgan, he can't hear you."

"He's unconscious."

"Oh God…"

"How can we get down there?"

"He wasn't shot?"

"No. The gunshots came from far away. The way we came from, I think."

"They just made him jump. Straight into a ravine. Genius."

"Oh no… no, no, no. Hotch,_ Garcia._ Who else would they be shooting at?"

Rossi grunted as he just barely caught himself from joining Reid at the bottom of the ravine. "One problem at a time, Morgan," he yelled.

Morgan stood indecisively for a moment, lending Hotch some support climbing down a ledge closer. "Rossi, Hotch. You two take care of Reid, I'll head back to the jet. I need to make sure she's okay too."

"Morgan, do _not_ climb back up there. We have enough on our hands to panic over as it is. They might have had a violent dispute while they were out hunting, yeah? Or probably spotted some deer on route."

"Bullshit."

"Stop, we're almost there. We'll need a hand pulling him up."

"No. This was a mistake to begin with. You think this ledge can hold three men while they drag up a fourth? I'm climbing back."

"_Morgan_."

"Don't make me play the superior card."

"Seriously? You think rank means anything at this point in time?"

"Uhh."

"What?"

"…That was Reid."

"Reid?" Morgan immediately turned back and carelessly descended down a two meter ledge, almost sliding down a foot too far. "Reid! We're almost there! Hang on!"

"Uhhhh… wha?"

Hotch, placing his foot prematurely on a loose mound of rocks was mere seconds from joining Reid at the lowest ledge, when Morgan snagged him up by his collar and lifted him up by the back of his shirt. It took them both a moment to catch their breathes. "Thanks," "Don't mention it," and they were brought back on task when Reid's clear voice called up to them.

"I'm okay. I'm fine!"

"Not a good time to be lying, Spencer!" Rossi replied. "Anything broken? Give me the low-down on the medical chart."

It was hard to see his body let alone his expression through the thick foliage at the bottom of the ravine, but it was easy enough to picture the grimace of pain as he screamed out.

"_Reid?_"

"Bruh… Broken arm. Closed fracture of the shaft of the radial bone. Ah… on the right… Other arm's bruised but okay." He took a moment to get his breath back and then everyone climbing down from above heard a sigh of relief. "Muh… my neck – I strained a muscle on the side but I don't think anything's broken. I can move my legs. Nothing else is broken."

"Reid, don't move. We're coming down to get you!"

"Stop… stop shouting. They'll hear you. Uh…" He gave out a disgruntled noise that balanced on the fence between pained and nauseated.

"Reid?"

"Headache. Baad headache." From the movement in the brush, you could tell he was levering himself up. "And dizziness. You can add that to the list."

"Concussion?"

"Most likely."

"Reid, can you get up?" Rossi yelled down as he stepped foot a ledge lower.

"Uhh. Yeah. Yeah, I'm getting up."

"Is that a good idea?" Hotch inquired.

"What else can we do? Leave him down there indefinitely?"

"He'd probably be safer…" Hotch sighed.

"And I thought I was the optimistic one."

"So what, we'd sweep up this situation, then come back for him later?" Morgan murmured back.

"In the middle of this vast forest, when we don't even know the direction of the jet we were in an hour ago?" Rossi chipped in.

"Where they could track half a dozen footsteps and find him like a sitting duck?"

"No signal, no weapons…"

"Come on, Hotch. He can get up, he can walk. We'll deal with the broken arm and the concussion like we'll deal with the rest of this crap. We've been through worse."

"I didn't mean that we should leave him. I was just saying he'd probably be safer lying in the shrubbery than dragged along with the rest of us. We're a solid wall of target signs as it is."

They were whispering among the three of them, but so close to their goal now, that Reid could doubtlessly hear them. But when they reached him, they saw an expression so overwhelmed with bottled pain that no new information could possibly have squeezed in. His lip was bitten, his brow wrinkled, and he sat up with his left arm shading his eyes.

"Reid?" Morgan carefully placed a hand on his back. He didn't react.

"Is it the arm?" Hotch inquired. It certainly didn't look great, half supported on his knee with a prominent bump on one side just asking to break free from its keratinised confines.

His lip had been bitten through until beads of blood shone through. "It's my head. I sat up and it exploded."

"Lie back down."

"No… no, the pain's easing off." His remark was mirrored on his face. The wrinkle loosened, the muscles relaxed. "It's okay. I can get up. The pain's back down to an eight. I'm fine."

"An eight?"

Reid levered himself up with the help of his friends and they began the slow climb back up.

"Is he okay?" JJ called down to them.

"Broken arm. Concussion. Better than new."

It took another ten – fifteen minutes but they were finally back where they had started at the top of the ravine. In retrospect, it was neither as steep nor as deep as it had appeared from above, but that didn't make an unexpected descent any less painful.

"Reid, thank God." JJ carefully enveloped him in her arms, mindful of the useless limb he held delicately against his chest. "It's always you, isn't it? What happened?" she asked into the crook of his neck.

"I heard a gunshot and I jumped."

"Into a ravine?"

"I jumped on reflex. I admit it… wasn't…"

JJ pulled away from him to look him straight in the face. She called his name, but he was staring out over her shoulder with an empty expression. He didn't reply but just murmured to himself. "wasn't… where's? … Where's…?

"Hotch," JJ called. They were at her side in seconds, having not yet strayed far. "Hotch, his eyes!"

"One's more dilated than the other…"

With barely any warning, Reid gave out a piercing shout, half-moan, half-scream, and then his body stiffened visibly; every muscle contracting against every other, until he looked as if he might snap. Everything straight out of a nightmare.

"_Reid!_"

His eyes widened and the shout exhausted all its air, and the next thing anyone knew, Reid had fallen completely limp and crumpled into himself. He would have landed heavily against the rocks if it hadn't been for four strong pairs of hands catching him and lowering him slowly to the ground.

His neck hyperextended, his spine curved and his legs bent loosely, and then he started to convulse. His legs juddered of their own accord, his head rolled from one side to the other, and his face took on an expression of senseless terror. Adding to the shocking effect, his eyes rolled backwards and a driblet of blood leaked from the side of his mouth, down his clenched jaw. Mindless of the fractured arm, he started striking the both of them against his sides, and against the rocks, all the while offering up startled grunting sounds. All of the muscles of his out-thrust neck stood out boldly through his pale skin.

The team froze in sheer panic.

"_He's having a seizure_," Rossi exclaimed.

"What do we do?"

The spasms started slowly, everything clenching, shaking, thrashing, his spine straightening, stiffening, bending. More blood trickled out from the corner of his mouth.

"Hold onto his arm, keep him from damaging it more."

"Should we put something in his mouth? Keep him from biting his tongue?"

"I don't think so… should we?"

Four pairs of hands clasped the flailing body, stilling its uncontrollable shaking. By increments, the thrashes slowed but became larger. Contract, relax, contract. Relax.

Contract… relax…

Contract…

Flinch. Twitch. Twitch.

Judder.

Still.

His head rolled back on his neck and his eyelids shut. Judging from appearances, he could have merely been taking a nap. Save for his colleagues groping his arms and his head.

His eyes flickered open.

"Wha… what hap…"

"You had a seizure."

"A… seizure… what the hell…"

He panted, entirely out of breath for a minute, still lying on the floor, his friends having backed away. The now sat crouched around him, looking just as exhausted, and even more relieved than himself.

"You were talking, then all of a sudden, you-"

"Talking… what was I… where's…?"

He looked with unfocused eyes at each team member, before Hotch caught on.

"Where's Blake?"

* * *

I studied epilepsy at university this year, but I've never seen a seizure in the flesh, so there may well be mistakes in my description. I don't think I've come across this particular brand of whump before, so I thought I'd pedal some of my own concoction outside the fanficmarket. If anyone knows which aisle it's kept in, or can recommend me any person-favourite flavours, please do. Also, please review. Reviews keep me motivated.


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